


Everybody Makes Mistakes

by Catchclaw



Series: Mental Mimosa [141]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Feelings Realization, Human Castiel, M/M, Season/Series 09, Trapped In A Closet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-14
Updated: 2018-09-14
Packaged: 2019-07-12 04:32:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15987683
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Catchclaw/pseuds/Catchclaw
Summary: “All right, so,” Dean said. “This is terrible.”





	Everybody Makes Mistakes

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Enclosed spaces. Prompt from this [generator](http://bleep0bleep.tumblr.com/prompts).

“All right, so,” Dean said. “This is terrible.”

Castiel grunted, the sound hot and loud in Dean’s ear. “Thank you for stating the obvious.”

Dean’s fingers slipped on the doorknob, yanking in a semi-desperate attempt that used up the last of his cool. “No, the obvious, Cas, is that this is all your fucking fault.”

“I don’t see how that’s possible.”

“Of course you don’t.”

“Now is not the time for an argument, Dean.”

“Oh, really? I’m sorry. You wanna play shuffleboard or something? Maybe some fucking croquet?” Dean shifted, tried to, but the space was too small, the closet too narrow, and there was no place to go with Cas jammed up against his back. “I mean, hell, man. You’ve got options.”

Cas made an irritated sound. “We,” he said, “need to concentrate on getting out, not on your childish need to be right. Try the knob again.”

“What the fuck do you think I’ve been doing?”

Cas’s hand wormed around Dean’s side and dove for the door.

“Hey, hey! Watch where you’re groping.”

The knob rattled again, the hinges, and Cas harrumphed against Dean’s neck. “It seems to be jammed.”

“Whammied, more like it. Old as this place is, this hardware should be ready to give. But it feels like there’s more force that that behind it. Like something’s actively holding the damn thing closed.”

“I wasn’t aware,” Cas said dryly, “that ghosts were found of taking prisoners.”

“No,” Dean said, keenly and profoundly aware that Cas’ hand was still on the knob, that it was tucked by necessity between Dean’s hips and the door, “but some of them do like fucking with people, that’s for damn sure.”

Cas twisted his wrist and drew his hand back. "Do they?” he asked.

“Yeah. Sometimes. Being dead must get boring. Something to do, screwing around with humans, isn’t it?”

Cas was quiet for a moment. The dark around them sank in a little, pooled chilly in the back of Dean’s throat. He was aware of his heartbeat, not just the clutch in his chest, but the warm shove of blood through his veins, the click open sigh of each and every goddamn breath.

God, Cas was close. And warm. Not cold as he had been once, iced in that ethereal way. He even smelled different. Gone was the thunderstorm thing he’d always rocked as an angel; now, as a human, he smelled like sweat and soap, like the coffee he’d started drinking by the gallon, like the Juicy Fruit he liked stealing from Sam. He smelled like Tide, a little, like damp, like wet clothes hung up to dry in the sun. He smelled like the bunker, truth be told, a familiar sort of musty, like secrets kept too long, like the long-forgotten past.

Dean closed his eyes--or did he? It was hard to keep track of where your lids were when you were swallowed by shadow--and tried not to give into the sudden urge to lean back, to tip his head against Castiel’s shoulder and let the chips fall where they may.

That he dreamed about Cas sometimes was no big deal; where his subconscious went on its own time was none of Dean’s business. That he liked looking over in the car and seeing Cas there, fingers drumming on his knee and his head half-stuck out the window, grinning into the oncoming breeze--ok, so Dean was sentimental about whoever rode shotgun. That was his right.

That there were times in the shower, or in the back of some bar, when there was a friendly hand on his dick and all of a sudden, in the midst of the hey now, his head ran into Cas, when it showed him those laser eyes that missed nothing even when they were half-closed, or those long, delicate fingers or that wide, sassy mouth so eager these days to ask _why_ , to say _let me help you_ , to reach out and squeeze Dean’s shoulder for no good reason at all--well, all that was way outside of Dean’s personal freaking control. So he liked Cas. Duh. He always had, even when Cas had done something exceptionally dumb. Even after Crowley, after not quite dying, after letting himself become a murderous angel automaton--after all that, given enough time and some distance, Cas always found a way to drift back in Dean’s ledger back into the black.

Some of it was loyalty. Some of it was stubborn. Some of it was how good Cas looked in a towel, the way he wandered dripping through the kitchen after his shower, just enough sense knocked into his head by the steam to make him crave hot, fluffy toast.

And some of it, Dean thought, stuck in that fucking closet in Greensboro, Tennessee, the worst of it, had nothing to do with any tangible reason other than fundamental, boneheaded love.

It was the whole reason he’d come running when he’d heard Castiel yell, when he’d heard the ghost give up that fucking terrifying, blood curdling scream: Cas was in danger, Cas needed him, and god help him, if that meant he had to bolt his ass up five flights of rickety wood stairs just to get to Cas, then so fucking be it. After all this time, all this fight, there was no way in hell he was gonna let something so basic as a backwater ghost snatch the love of his life away.

Oh, _fuck_.

“You seem worried,” Cas said.

Dean braced his hands on the wall, tried to keep his breath steady, life-altering realizations notwithstanding. "No, no, man. I’m ok.”

“Sam will find us. I’m fairly certain. This house, for all its oddities, isn’t that large.”

“Yeah, Cas. I got that.”

He felt Castiel shift, heard him swallow. “I’m sorry,” Cas said quietly. “I should’ve waited for you on the second floor, as you’d asked. But I heard something up here, so I just--”

“It’s fine,” Dean said. “Really.”

“I admit that I underestimated the strength of this particular spirit. We all would’ve been better served had I--”

“ _Hey_ ,” Dean said, snapping the word between his teeth, “Dimmesdale, can it with the self-flagellation, huh? Everybody makes mistakes. You’re new at this, ok? I get that.”

“Yes, but--”

“Dude, seriously? Enough. Stop. I can’t deal with this right now. Like not at all.”

Castiel’s breath sharpened. “I’m trying to apologize, Dean!”

“And I’m telling you to shut up! I can’t think with you yammering.”


End file.
